Rainbow oil pipeline leak largest in 36 years

An oil spill in a remote northwestern corner of Alberta has turned out to be the province’s largest in 36 years, according to regulators.

Approximately 28,000 barrels of oil were spilled in the Rainbow pipeline rupture, which was discovered April 29, the Energy Resources Conservation Board said Tuesday.

A spill of that magnitude on a provincial pipeline hasn’t happened since 1975 when the Bow Valley line leaked 40,000 barrels of oil, said board spokesman Davis Sheremata.

“This is the biggest crude oil pipeline spill that we’ve had in certainly some time,” Sheremata said.

Crews reached and exposed the damaged section of Rainbow pipe Tuesday afternoon after being hampered by boggy conditions. Sheremata said the spill had been contained and cleanup efforts were ongoing, Sheremata said.

The Rainbow pipeline carries about 187,000 barrels of oil per day from Zama in northwest Alberta 770 km south to Edmonton.

Last Friday, operator Plains Midstream Canada, a branch of Houston-based Plains All American Pipeline, discovered the spill after its system detected a drop in pressure about 100 kilometres northeast of Peace River.

It was the second in six years on the line, which ruptured near Slave Lake in 2005, releasing about 930 barrels of oil.

The company has not determined the cause of last week’s leak, and had not released an estimated volume of the spill.

The oil spread along the pipeline’s right-of-way and into nearby sloughs, but remains about 300 metres, slightly more than a city block, away from flowing water or runoff, the ERCB said.

Last year an Enbridge Inc. pipeline ruptured in Michigan, releasing more than 20,000 barrels of sour oil into waterways leading to the scenic Kalamazoo River. Backlash over the incident, which shut down the Line 6 system for nine weeks, resulted U.S. congressional hearings, tightened regulations and millions of dollars in fines for the Calgary-based pipeline giant.

Plains said it resumed partial operations south of the ruptured Rainbow pipeline on Monday after installing plugs on either end of the damaged section. The open section will flow about half the usual volume of oil.

The company expects to complete repairs by the end of the week, but restarting the repaired section of the line will require regulatory approval.

The Rainbow leak was the second to happen in Alberta in less than two weeks. On April 22 landowners riding horseback discovered oil on their property near Edson, resulting in Kinder Morgan shutting down its Alberta-to-Washington Trans Mountain pipeline for almost a week.

An investigation into the incident uncovered a crack in a welded segment of the 57-year-old pipeline as the probable cause of the leak.

Environmental think-tank the Pembina Institute questioned how quickly the Rainbow pipeline was approved to resume partial operations, and whether age played a factor in the break in the 44-year-old pipeline.

“There are some important questions that need to be asked about whether or not, as that infrastructure ages, is the government increasing its scrutiny and requirements of pipeline operators to make sure those pipelines are still safe,” said spokesman Dan Woynillowicz. “Or are we actually on the cusp, as some of these pipelines break the 40- or 50-year mark, of having higher incidents of spills.”

Alberta is criss-crossed by thousands of kilometres of oil and natural gas pipeline, which are regularly inspected and maintained by their operators, with age playing a relatively small factor in their overall integrity, said Brenda Kenny, president of the Canadian Energy Pipeline Association.

Advances in technology have increased pipeline maintenance procedures and safety, she noted. Where more work does need to be done is in pushing operators to be more open with the public.

“We all benefit from strong regulation and we need a continued and growing measure of transparency so that people can have increased confidence that we are doing the right things,” Kenny said. “We owe it to the public to be held accountable for that.”

Major regional operator Pembina Pipeline, which transports about 1.1 million barrels of oil per day through the province and British Columbia, said inspections, repairs and replacement of pipeline sections enables operators to keep running systems safely.

“With proper maintenance we expect the life of a pipeline to be infinite,” spokeswoman Shawn Davis said.

Until the Rainbow pipeline is fully operational, oil producer Penn West Petroleum said it was using trucks, storage and alternative pipelines to move its production south.

The Calgary-based company produces about 100,000 barrels per day of oil in northern Alberta, but did not disclose how much crude was being trucked.

Trucking company EnerMAX Services said it was moving oil along routes east to Gordondale rather than Valleyview because of the outage, according to Bloomberg.

domeara@calgaryherald.com

Comments

We encourage all readers to share their views on our articles and blog posts. We are committed to maintaining a lively but civil forum for discussion, so we ask you to avoid personal attacks, and please keep your comments relevant and respectful. If you encounter a comment that is abusive, click the "X" in the upper right corner of the comment box to report spam or abuse. We are using Facebook commenting. Visit our FAQ page for more information.